Many baseball people dislike the idea that there is a ‘clutch’ stat. It is not an official MLB statistic. Ben Revere thrives in those spots this year and with runners in scoring position and 2 outs he is now hitting .417 and since it is not an official stat we can enjoy it for what it is, and the small sample size package it comes in.
Why not celebrate Ben Revere for the good plays because he has received enough grief from people who wanted him sent back to where he came from until his breakout 4-5 game earlier in the week when he changed a few minds. Quietly though Ben has been coming up big in RBI spots since he came off of the disabled list. You go from the outhouse to the penthouse and back again quickly in sports which is why you enjoy the ride up! Even when Revere was not getting hits when bases were empty, Revere was getting them with runners in scoring position.
Revere now ranks 9th in the entire National League in RISP situations for batters with at least 25 at-bats batting .393, and has moved ahead of Wilson Ramos who is 12th at .379.
Ben Revere has 42 hits all season and 11 are when runners are in scoring position which ranks him the highest in the Majors behind only Daniel Descalso who only seems to only hit in RISP spots.
RISP is not the same as the Hi Lev formula which takes all of the highest leverage situations into account which is more than just RISP hits. In all spots when you need a key hit Bryce Harper leads the team in OPS, Ramos in BA, and Daniel Murphy and Jayson Werth have flair for the dramatic. Clint Robinson and Matt den Dekker seem to be near the top of the list for the bench players. Danny Espinosa does not have a high BA in these spots, but he finds a way to get on base either by a walk or a HBP just like last night.
Ben Revere knows from this year how unfair this game could be at times. He summed it up after the game, “Baseball sucks…You ask Jayson Werth, he’s been in the game 100 years, and he says, ‘It sucks.’ ”
“One, if by land, and two, if by sea” was coined by the American poet, Henry W. Longfellow in his poem, Paul Revere’s Ride. Last night it was Ben Revere’s Ride, “One, if by the scoreboard, and two, if beyond the scoreboard”. Revere tried to replicate that shot he hit off of Rafael Soriano, but on this night the Nats only needed the one off of the scoreboard to send Danny Espinosa to the plate as the winning walk-off run.
